WSP07218

• File Number: 8220.107.A
• Description: Basalt Participating Project
• State: CO
• Basin: Colorado Mainstem
• Water Division: 5
• Date: 2/28/1973
• Title: Information Sheets - Basalt Project-Colorado
• Water Supply Pro - Doc Type: Project Overview

"

(' "J
~

'-

UC-700
2/28/73

Information Sheets
Basalt Project, Colorado

Location

Between the communities of Aspen and Glenwood Springs along the Roaring
Fork River ana its tributaries in Garfield, Eagle, and Pitkin Counties
of west-central Colorado.

Status

The authorizing act for the Fryingpan-Arkansas Project (P.L. 87-590
dated July 16, 1962) directed the Secretary of the Interior to expedite
completioh of his planning report on the Basalt Project as a potential
participating projec~ under the Colorado River Storage Project (P.L. 485).
The project feasibility investigations were initiated in ~~y 1967 with
the Proposed Regional Director's Report scheduled for completion by the
end of June 1973.

Previous Investigations

A plan to provide more irrigation water for the Cattle Creek area was
outlined in the Bureau of Reclamation's Colorado River Report of March
1946 which inventoried potential reclamation developments in the entire
Colorado River Basin. The Cattle Creek plan involved enlargement of
Missouri Heights Reservoir and the reservoir feeder canal from Cattle
Creek. Later studies showed, however, that runoff of Cattle Creek would
be insufficient in many years to fill the additional capacity of the
reservoir.

Further reconnaissance plans for the development of the water resources
of the Colorado River Basin above the mouth of the Gunnison River at
Grand Junction, Colorado, were reported by the Bureau of Reclamation in
its status report of February 1954 entitled "Cliffs-Divide Project."
A plan was presented for the Cattle Creek unit of the Cliffs-Divide
Project which would increase the irrigation supplies for Cattle Creek
and Spring Valley areas and bench lands on Missouri Heights and Spring
Valley. The plan involved the importation of water to the Cattle
Creek drainage area and the regulation and distribution of the water
for irrigation. The water would be imported from Cottonwood Creek, a
tributary of the Colorado River; East Brush Creek, an Eagle River tribu-
tary; and 15 small tributaries of Fryingpan River. The reconnaissance
studies showed this plan to be questionable economically with a benefit-
cost ratio of slightly less than unity.

Plans for utilizing the water of Ruedi Reservoir. as well as surplus
flows of the Fryingpan River in the Basalt Project area, on the basis
of reconnaissance studies are described in a report dated August 1959
made for the Colorado Water Conservation Board by the Colorado River
Water Conservation District. This report is appended to the Bureau of
Reclamation report of September 1959 on the, Ruedi Dam and Reservoir,